A friend asked me what I think of Anselm’s famous
Ontological Argument for God’s existence. For those unfamiliar with it, the
Ontological Argument is this:
1) It is a conceptual
truth (or, so to speak, true by definition) that God is a being than which none
greater can be imagined (that is, the greatest possible being that can be imagined).
2) God exists as an idea
in the mind.
3) A being that exists as
an idea in the mind and in reality is, other things being equal, greater than a
being that exists only as an idea in the mind.
4) Thus, if God exists
only as an idea in the mind, then we can imagine something that is greater than
God (that is, a greatest possible being that does exist).
5) But we cannot imagine
something that is greater than God (for it is a contradiction to suppose that
we can imagine a being greater than the greatest possible being that can be
imagined.)
6) Therefore, God exists.
Anselm's Ontological
Argument is interesting: It’s not as ill-conceived as many atheists claim,
because Anselm was not trying to prove God's existence in the traditional
sense, he was merely stating a belief in God and trying to show why he thought
such a belief is rational. And equally it’s not as compelling as some
Christians think, because his argument ultimately comes to grief whenever it is
mistakenly offered as straightforward evidence for God.
Ideas like Anselm’s
Ontological Argument work best as demonstrative, investigative ideas based on
the assumption of God’s existence and that this belief is substantiated by rational
sense. Arguments of the kind Anselm propounded are not so much a priori proofs of faith; rather they
are a posteriori demonstrations of
the harmonious link between faith and its metaphysical profundities and
narrative-intense structures.
I think the ultimate point
related to the Ontological Argument is whether God's nature is something
qualitatively different from anything else we experience, or whether the
attributes of God are filtrated into human emotions (like love, grace, mercy
and justice) in an inexpressibly larger quantity (this is known as ‘kinesis’).
When thought of that way, ideas like Anselm’s are very interesting starting
blocks for much deeper spiritual contemplations.
When one reads poetry,
fantasy novels and science fiction books, the primary force of the creativity
comes from improvement of concepts that are already familiar to the everyday
person (however strange the narrative). If they did not pertain to
representations of life projected in everyday living they would not be sold in
their millions.
With the concept of God
and whether one can imagine something so far beyond naturalistic mental
precipitations that God must be reasonably inferred, the question, I think,
would be something like; can it be shown that we are projecting not just a
quantitative change in our current understanding but also a qualitative change
in it; and if the latter, what/where is the demarcation line?
First off, how the form
provides us with narrative and metaphor and symbolism is complex because it
impinges upon the extraction of meaning facilitated by our mental resources. When
it comes to God's word in scripture we extract meaning and contextualisation,
but that meaning and contextualisation is played out against a further backdrop
of meaning and contextualisation in being itself - a sort of meta-meaning and
meta-contextualisation. For example, a parable about human kindness and
solicitude like the Parable of the Good Samaritan has meaning based on singular
instances of helping those in need, but a broader meta-meaning can be extracted
from the story related to the overall well-being of the human race and the
psychological development of those who act with great concern for others.
One of my favourite
allusions to the Ontological Argument is in the Narnia tale The Silver Chair – it's known as
Puddleglum's speech:
‘One word, Ma’am.
All you’ve been saying is quite right, I shouldn’t wonder. I’m a chap
who always liked to know the worst of things and then put the best face I can
on it. So I won’t deny any of what you said. But there’s one thing more to be
said, even so. Suppose we have only dreamed, or made up, all those things–trees
and grass and sun and moon and stars and Aslan himself. .Then all I can say is,
in that case, the made-up things seem a good deal more important than the real
ones. Suppose this black pit of a kingdom of yours is the only world. Well, it
strikes me as a pretty poor one. And that’s a funny thing, when you come to
think of it. We’re just four babies making up a game, if you’re right. But four
babies playing a game can make a play-world which licks your real world hollow.
That’s why I’m going to stand by the play-world. I’m on Aslan’s side even if
there isn’t any Aslan to lead it. I’m going to live as like a Narnian as I can,
even if there isn’t any Narnia. So we’re leaving your court at once and setting
out in the dark to spend our lives looking for Overland
The upper world is Aslan's
world, which of course represents what Christ drives us towards in a
relationship with Him. Just like Pascal’s wager, C.S. Lewis is stating what we
could call ‘Puddleglum's Wager’ - which expresses that even if Jesus isn’t God,
it is still a better life pursuing the world envisaged by Christ. It is a
probabilistic venture based on the wisdom of Christ even aside from the
supernatural – and it calls for a courage that many find difficult, because it
asks us to ‘be perfect’ - which is about the most supernaturally unnatural
thing anyone has ever said while also sounding perfectly truthful and authentic
in saying it.
The quintessence of its
magic is in another altogether unexpected form; roughly this; ‘Don’t worry if
you cannot believe that there’s a God’ just believe you have the courage to act
as though there is one, and by your failing to live up to the standards you’ll
increase your probability of belief’. I think that really is the genius of
Christ – and shows precisely His coming to earth just once was more than enough
for humankind to fall at their feet, believe, and have everything we need for a
full life. With this, you can see why Christ assured us that, for anyone who
asks, the full life will be given to them -
"Seek and you will find; knock and the door will
be opened to you. For everyone who asks receives; the one who seeks finds; and
to the one who knocks, the door will be opened."
Puddleglum's speech is
basically this: if Narnia does not exist, then fiction is more stupendous than
reality - and as fiction cannot be more stupendous than reality, Narnia must be
real. To translate that into Christian thinking as regards the Ontological
Argument, then if Christ's claims are not based on Him being the truth, Christ's
fiction appears to me to be more stupendous than any truth out there.
What I'm always telling
the atheists is that I personally know of no better way to live, or no greater
standards to which I’d want to adhere. I’m on Jesus’ side even if there isn’t
any Jesus to lead the Christian world. If I’m guilty of making a play-world,
then I fancy that the play-world into which I’m immersed and to which I’m
committed licks the other ‘real’ world hollow.
